The Ones Who Bare Their Teeth
by transtemporal
Summary: When mysterious transdimensional collectors threaten to build an army of captured Smash fighters, the burden of responsibility falls upon a chosen few to hunt them down. But what begins as a simple task soon becomes desperate clawing for freedom as they become pawns in a tangled game of unbidden power, shrouded intentions, and danger beyond their imagining.
1. Chapter 1

**Hi everyone! I'm Lyra and this is my first story (on this account, anyway)! I rated it T because I wasn't sure, but there will be *some* strong language and *some* violence, so consider this a sort of warning. I don't own Smash Brothers or Nintendo or any of that. I plan to write quite a few chapters for this story (if I don't run out of steam) and I hope you like it! Leave a review if you feel up to it (you don't have to, of course)! Anyway, please enjoy.**

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 _It won't hurt a bit, miss._

Samus Aran awoke, her eyelids heavy with death-like sleep and the faint smell of ammonia and metal in her nostrils. She did not immediately know where she was. Her memory was fuzzy, blurred, like trying to squint through a soiled filter. Outlines of people, masked shapes, a man with a syringe.

 _It won't hurt a bit, miss._

Utter nonsense.

She groaned into the silence, stretching her limbs until she heard the satisfying cracking of joints. It felt like her entire body had taken a beating – and in fact, maybe it had. She suspected that she had been involved in some kind of struggle, but why? Where? With who? And why had she ended up here?

All she knew could be compiled into three tidy little categories: 1, she was lying on a downy hospital bed; 2, her stomach was knotted up with hunger; and 3, somebody had better tell her what the hell happened, ASAP, or heads would rolling on the floor, neatly detached from their bodies.

Minutes passed. She looked around the room, taking it in with sharp eyes. Fluorescent lights bathed the room in glaring bluish-white. There were monitors, drips, massive computers, things that _beeped_ and flashedin time with her heartbeat; machines sitting around the bed like a collection of old, tired dinosaurs, winking their red eyes at her. It was definitely a hospital room. And there was a window, too, but the blinds were shut so tightly that she couldn't tell if it was night or day. Samus was just wondering whether she should get up and check when the door creaked open and in peeked a young nurse, her corkscrew curls bouncing childishly about her face.

"Oh," she said, seeing that Samus was awake. "Do you need anything, miss?"

Samus cleared her throat. It felt full of hot needles. "Water."

"Okay, I'll be right b –"

"But before you do that," said Samus stonily, "you might as well tell me why the _hell_ I'm here."

The nurse hesitated. "I – I can't really –"

"Then bring me someone who _can,"_ growled Samus.

"Alright, I'll fetch him," said the nurse meekly. "One moment please."

She scurried off.

Samus took a few minutes to examine her own body. Fingers, intact. Toes, accounted for. She stretched and flexed languidly, looking for bruises or scratches, something indicative of a struggle. There was an old, yellowing bruise from a nasty fight she'd had last week, but nothing else. She was even wearing the same clothes. It was as if she were whisked unceremoniously out of her day-to-day life and dumped here, in this bare-bones hospital room, as easily as you might pluck a goddamned feather. Which was slightly embarrassing for her, Samus Aran, the most feared bounty hunter in the galaxy – the nightmare figure that space pirates' children whispered ghost stories about at night. Surely she would have fought off anyone who tried to abduct her…or at least _tried…_

 _It won't hurt a bit, miss._

Why did that keep coming back to her?

She swung her feet over to the side of the bed and was about to stand up when the door opened again, and a middle-aged man walked in. He was tall (not as tall as Samus), gloved, and self-assured, with an air of warm easiness – the confident stature of a man who never had to raise his voice to get what he wanted. A smile spread over his face like a spill of warm honey, but Samus watched his eyes. They were startlingly dark. The dark of briny seaside rocks; the kind that caused shipwrecks.

"Hello, Samus," he said pleasantly.

She was not taken by this stranger. She said nothing, her lips stiffening.

"I heard you yelled at my favorite nurse," the man continued. She could see shimmering gold makeup around his eyes. "But that's understandable. You're likely confused. The tranquilizer has a habit of clouding up the brain, you know."

His voice tremored, threatening to burst into laughter. Evidently tranquilizing innocent people was hilarious.

"You've been out for about eight hours," he continued, once he'd gotten a hold of himself. "That's pretty light, considering the dose we shot you with. Are you sore? Tired? Dizzy?"

"I'm angry," said Samus simply. She felt hot stabbings of pain in her parched throat.

"Ah, naturally," said the man. He touched his hands to his lips, observing her, and then brought them awkwardly back down. "Well. Let me assure you straight off the bat that I have no intentions to harm you, or even to keep you here. This is a…ehm, a regrettable tactic that we resorted to…drugging people against their will isn't exactly, well, an honorable thing to put on one's resume…"

Samus snorted.

"…but I, or, well, that is to say… _we..._ need you here, and you wouldn't entertain our other pleas for help, so we... _._ decided to grab your attention."

"What pleas for help?" said Samus. She felt fury coil in her stomach, making her clench the bedsheets with her hands. The words came out perfectly calm, but she thought incoherently, _how dare you act like this is my fault?_

"We sent you many letters and messages," said the man patiently. "We suspect that either they were ignored by you or intercepted."

"What the ever-loving fuck are you talking about?"

"The _letters,_ Samus," the man repeated. Like saying it any more emphatically would suddenly make her remember. "The _phone calls,_ the messages that we passed along through your superiors –"

"I didn't get anything," said Samus, mystified.

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."

They stared at each other for a moment.

"That confirms it, then," said the man. "The messages have been intercepted. We suspected as much. None of the other…ah… _candidates_ responded, either. Which is why we had to take the initiative and bring you here. We're running out of t –"

The young, bouncy nurse opened the tar and poked her head in.

"I have water for Miss Aran," she said in a shrinking voice, and Samus suddenly felt bad for snapping at her before.

"Come in, then," said the man. If he was irritated at the interruption, he didn't show it. He only smiled at Samus more pleasantly than ever. The nurse handed her a bottle of water, labelled shiningly as a brand she'd never heard of. Then she hurried out again, leaving the door ajar.

Samus brandished the water bottle. "I'm giving you one chance to explain everything," she said in a voice close to a snarl. "I want to know what's going on. Give me the 'why's and the 'how's. Throw in a couple of 'who's if you feel up to it. But if you don't explain all this shit _right now,_ I'm going to make you sorry."

"Oh, I don't doubt it," said the man, looking appreciatively at her muscular frame. He closed the door. "May I sit?"

Samus glowered at him, but nestled herself back into the bed, sitting cross-legged while he clambered on opposite of her. Up close, she could see sweat beading on his forehead, dampening his closely sheared curls.

"What do you want to know first?" he asked.

She took a long draught of water, coughed, and said, "Your name."

"Master Hand."

"What?"

"That's my name. Master Hand."

It sounded like a cartoon character. Any fear she might have had of him flew right out the window, whistling as it went. _"Why?"_

"Are you asking me why that's my name?" he said, looking perplexed.

"Yeah," said Samus. "I mean, you don't just have a nickname like that for no reason."

"It's not a nickname. That's my name."

"Oh, come on."

"I'm not sure what else to tell you, Samus."

"What does your mother call you? Is that like…on your birth certificate? Master, space, Hand?"

The man stared at her, shook his head a little as if shaking away flies, and said, "I sense we're getting a little off track here. Is there anything you want to know, about, you know, the situation?"

She took another drink of water. Her anger rekindled.

"What exactly _is_ the situation? Why have you kidnapped me?"

Master Hand seemed to steel himself. "We…as in _all_ of us"- he made a circling gesture –"are in terrible danger. Every innocent person in every world and planet imaginable."

Coldness swooped through her, like winter air shooting through a porthole.

"Everybody?" Samus said, agape. "How is that possible?"

"Well – nearly everybody. Are you familiar with the concept of parallel worlds?"

She nodded suspiciously.

"They're real. There are thousands of them. We're not sure of the exact amount. Could be that there are an infinite number of them. People from other worlds, completely different worlds, living out their lives right alongside us. And people can cross-drift, like scions in plants. Crossover to other worlds. It's an unstable process, but it can be done."

Samus finished off her water bottle and crumpled it up. She watched him talking, his glossy lips shaping each word as if it were the most important word he'd ever said. An uncomfortable numbness like ice was spreading through her chest.

"What do you mean worlds? Like planets?" she said.

"No, like…universes. Think of everything you know – every planet, every piece of darkness between the stars. That's your world."

"And people can travel between worlds?"

"Only small numbers of people," said Master Hand carefully. "We call them _interlopers._ They drift through worlds and see everything, experience everything. And at some point –as people tend to do - interlopers developed a… _hunger_."

Samus pictured a large jaw, opening and closing, opening and closing, dripping ropes of saliva.

"They didn't want to just see the different worlds, or sit back and watch them carry out their own affairs. The interlopers are like… _collectors_ , I guess. They want to collect things, people, experiences. They have vast laboratories, museums…they are fascinated by powerful, sacred, and the forbidden. They wanted to travel through worlds and _take_ things for their collection."

Samus was listening hard. She was trying to picture the interlopers – perhaps she had seen one? She had explored the galaxy, had seen many different types of people and creatures...had she talked to one of these restless strangers, their eyes twitching with longing, their jaw heavy with hunger?

"Things," she said. "What things?"

"People, mostly."

She felt sickness bloom in her, and the acrid taste of bile rose in the back of her throat. She had to work hard to speak. "What's the point of collecting _people?"_

"For power and pleasure, I assume," said Master Hand. "They want people like you, Samus."

"What - famous people?"

"Powerful people. Legendary people."

"And what would they do with us?" asked Samus, her voice dripping with sarcasm. Inside, her heart was fluttering like a juvenile bird. "Display us like trophies. Polish us on Sundays –"

"We don't know," said Master Hand. "That's what we're trying to find out. We think, since they're only going after warriors and fighters, that maybe…"

"They're making an army," Samus said softly.

"Precisely," said Master Hand. "We don't know why. They might want to take over or destroy other parallel worlds, but that's merely speculation. Even so, you can see why we cannot allow it to happen."

"Yes," said Samus. Ripping open the universe, tearing into it like a ravenous dog – it struck her as profoundly wrong, as grotesquely taboo as matricide. Shutting down worlds, stars blinking out into blackness in the sky. She felt a chill ripple up her spine.

"They want an entire empire. They each want their own world. It's barbaric. Completely insane. They're like children, each wanting a turn with the toy."

"So…what, they're going after every famous fighter?" said Samus in disbelief. "So they can use them like pawns?"

"Not every single fighter," corrected Master Hand. "Only the really powerful ones."

"Including me?"

"We don't know their full plans, but I'm assuming yes."

She sat back, flabbergasted.

"I know," said Master Hand. He reach out as if to pat her comfortingly, but thought better of it; his hand wavered in the air for several awkward moments before resting again on his knee.

"Let me get this straight," said Samus. Her hands were claws on the bed, digging into the mattress. She was sweating. "A bunch of lunatics in wizard hats are rampaging around, trying to build some kind of misfit army."

"Yes. Essentially."

"And you think _I_ can stop this?"

"Yes. With some help."

Samus folded her arms across her chest, regarding him cautiously. "Help from you?"

"Help from the other candidates," said Master Hand, and a honey-sweet smile spread over his face again, as though glorying in his own genius. "They're also here."

"Mass abduction," muttered Samus.

He ignored this comment, saying brightly, "Would you like to meet them?"

"Hold on just a minute," said Samus, and she stood up. Towering over him felt good; like drawing from some ancient, underground power. "You _kidnapped_ all these people, same as you kidnapped me, and you think I'm just going to be magically okay with it?"

"Well –"

"Don't talk anymore," she said severely. "I'm getting really tired of your voice."

Master Hand closed his mouth, looking like he didn't quite know how to proceed. Samus stalked around the room, kicking one of the machines as she went. Pain throbbed in her foot. There was so much to process, and she hadn't been this angry in a very long time.

"I suppose you just stabbed me with a tranquilizer when I wasn't looking," she said abruptly, talking to the wall. "Really heroic. So brave of you, really."

That memory again – _it won't hurt a bit, miss._ A man with a syringe. She supposed it had been Master Hand, advancing on her without warning. People holding her arms back, their hands like vices, cold as steel traps, her an animal dying in chains –

"We were trying to save you, Samus," said Master Hand earnestly. She whirled on him, her nostrils flaring. "From the interlopers. We figured that if we got to you first –"

"Didn't I just tell you to stop talking?"

" – then we could get the upper hand. Without our intervention, you would have been in their grasp already."

"And there was no better way to do that than drugging me."

"I know you're angry," said Master Hand pleadingly. "But we had to act fast. We didn't have time to explain, and you wouldn't have gone with us otherwise. Please understand. This is a terrible thing to do, but the alternative is so much worse."

She pinched the bridge of her nose with her fingers, taking a calming breath. When she opened her eyes again, she felt a little less angry. "Okay. Say I believe you. What _exactly_ do you want me to do now?"

Master Hand stood up as well. She turned to face him, waiting. His eyes were glittering like beetles in his head, hectic spots of red appearing on his cheekbones in his excitement, a sheen of sweat glinting on his forehead.

"Kill them," he said.

She watched the machines blink red, like a devil's eye opening and closing, opening and closing. Killing was an achievable task. Killing was something she knew how to do.

He watched her hopefully, breathing hard through his nose. She could almost see the steam blowing in hot bursts from his nostrils, like dragon's fire. "Will you?" he asked. Outside, she imagined that the bubbly nurse was listening at the slit of the door, holding her breath.

She sighed. Cracked her thumbs. Said loftily, "Alright. I will."

Master Hand smiled.

"But," she said, popping the word out of her mouth like sweet candy, "if I die doing this, I am holding you personally accountable."

"Me too," said Master Hand. He held out a slightly sweaty hand, and she gingerly shook it. "Good to have you on board, Samus."

She felt a mixture of apprehension and – incredibly – excitement. But she clamped down hard on both of these feelings, assuming a brisk, business-like demeanor.

"I want to meet the others now," she said.

"Let's go, then."

Master Hand opened the door for her. They walked out into a dimly lit hallway, which looked more like a hospital than ever – white cinderblock walls, tile floor, nurses hurrying past with clipboards and status reports.

"You never did tell me why you're called Master Hand," said Samus, looking at him.

Master Hand smiled and said, "Because it is by my hand that all things occur." His eyes seemed to glint like the dull metal of a syringe, and Samus – amidst thoughts of how stupid that was – thought of claw-handed people and heavy jaws, trembling with hunger.

 _It won't hurt a bit, miss._

She shut the door behind her.


	2. Chapter 2

**Hi guys! Thanks for the nice reviews and thanks for your patience! Please enjoy :)**

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Samus and Master Hand walked side-by-side down the bustling hallway, with occasional stops while he explained medical things that she didn't care about ("This room is our inpatient care headquarters," and "this is our laboratory where we create the tranquilizers, it's a specialized sedative that's meant to mimic the restorative effects of sleep.") Her anger hadn't abated, but her curiosity about the 'other candidates' was overpowering. Who were the _legends_ that he'd spoken of? What did being a _legend_ entail? Warriors? Bounty hunters like her? She couldn't begin to comprehend the idea of parallel universes and the sheer diversity of people that could include, so she imagined seasoned space explorers, commanders in navy suits, spaceship operators with gritty voices and quick fingers; people familiar with her world. People she could trust.

Master Hand looked at her, and she realized he'd asked her a question.

"What?" she said, snapping back to reality.

"I said, are you ready?"

"Yeah," she said, feeling suddenly jittery.

"They're just beyond this door."

They approached the door, and then stopped. They were near enough that Samus could read a small peeling yellow sticker, placed lopsided above the knob: please keep door locked when room is unattended.

"The only reason you're not in there already is because we took you last," said Master Hand matter-of-factly, even though she hadn't asked. "Everybody has already been, ah, acclimated and brought up to speed about the situation."

"Okay," she said.

"They're a very diverse group of people, so please do not be startled."

"I won't be," said Samus, feeling very much like she was going through cultural sensitivity training. She could _feel_ Master Hand's hesitation pooling tar-like in the air. It did not do much to improve her nerves. "I've seen lots of different types of people in my lifetime already, Mr. Master-space-Hand."

"I know that," said Master Hand.

"Then open the door."

Looking resigned, he did, then stood aside. Samus walked in.

Her first thought was, _holy shit._

Her second: _this looks like a fucking zoo._

Animals, everywhere. Were they animals? Probably not. She could not discern what they were – colorful creatures, abnormal creatures, things that walked and talked and floated and glanced about themselves disdainfully, _intelligently._ There was a yellow mouse that occasionally sneezed out jumping sparks, a behemoth with a spiked shell, a beady-eyed dragon with a live flame hissing on the end of its tail, and even a walking blue thing that vaguely resembled a hedgehog, its comically huge eyes narrowed and its – tennis shoes? was it wearing tennis shoes? – yes, its tennis shoes tapping impatiently on the ground as if the whole world was moving too slowly. One of many alien-like creatures, their oddities too numerous to take in, drifting freely about the gymnasium-sized room. There were people, too, but not the stiff generals and commanders that Samus had expected; people that looked like they were ripped from storybook pages – swordsmen with colorful hair, sorcerers, a fairy princess in a dress that looked like a birthday cake, all pink and foamy.

She took a quick breath.

From behind her, Master Hand spoke, sounding faintly apologetic. "I know it's a bit much."

Dizziness betook her; she felt like she'd be doing loop-de-loops in her spaceship. Her knees were weak. Even as she watched, her eyes wide as saucers, the hedgehog disappeared in a blur and a new creature walked to the forefront of the ground: a cat-like monstrosity that looked only vaguely humanoid, its tail waving behind it like a smooth, purple tentacle.

"A bit _much?"_ she said. She meant to sound angry, but it came out breathless and squeaky.

Master Hand walked up beside her. The door shut with an echoing bang.

"Well, we figured you could handle it," he said. "Given that you've dealt with alien creatures before. This is hardly different."

"It's _hardly_ the same," snapped Samus. She could not tear her eyes from the crowd to glare at him, but she tried to direct all of her meanness sideways. "What the hell are these people?"

"Your teammates," said Master Hand, beaming.

"My _what?"_

"Your teammates," he said, as if she had merely not heard him. "I'm organizing all of you into different groups, and then I'm sending you out to search for interlopers. I can't in good conscience let you go alone. It's not safe."

"So it's better if I fight with the giant walking turtle?"

"That's Bowser," said Master Hand.

Oh, how badly she wanted to dig her heel in his face. "How are these things supposed to fit in my spaceship? Do they speak English? Can they even talk at all?"

"They speak English," said Master Hand. Then he appeared to think hard. "Actually. Not all of them. But you can communicate by hand gestures – "

"Hand gestures?" Samus croaked. "We're about to go on this big, dangerous journey that needs – I don't know, maybe _precision_ and _planning_ , and you expect me to talk to them with _hand gestures?"_

Master Hand babbled. "I mean, most of them understand English, so the hand gestures will be mostly on their end – actually, I think Bowser can speak, even though it's a bit, ehm, growly, but theoretically –"

"Stop talking," Samus advised him.

Master Hand pursed his lips and looked sourly at her. After a moment of silence, she decided that perhaps it would be better if she went to go talk to some of these people. Size them up, figure out what she was going to do. She scanned the crowd, skipping over the ones who looked frightened or meek or inhuman. Finally her eyes landed on the most muscular man there, a confident-looking man with a headband, who was engaged in conversation with a supernaturally pale yoga instructor. She pushed past Master Hand and strode toward him, ignoring the stammers of protest in her wake.

"Excuse me," she said, interrupting their conversation.

The yoga instructor looked her full in the face, and she stifled the urge to scream – the woman was nearly featureless, her face polished as a marble statue's. She fixed lidless eyes on Samus.

"Um, sorry," said Samus. She looked at the man, her heart beating hard. "I…um, do you mind if I talk to you for a second?"

"Sure," said the man. He blinked at the yoga instructor, who murmured a quiet goodbye and vanished into the sea of bodies.

"How can I help you?" he asked as soon as she was gone. His muscles bulged alarmingly from his arms and chest, more muscular than any man she'd ever seen, his throbbing veins so thick that they threatened to break through his skin. Jet-black hair stuck out wildly above his headband, perpetually slick with sweat. He noticed her ogling and smiled.

"What's your name?" she asked.

"Ryu." He held out a saucepan-sized hand. She took it.

"Samus."

They shook.

"Are you from around here, Ryu?" said Samus, surreptitiously massaging her hand.

"I am from a different world," said Ryu.

"There you go," said Samus, trying very hard not to sound as ignorant as she felt. "So am I."

"You are very pretty." He smiled at her.

She hated compliments about her looks, but she smiled back at him. "Well," she said. "At least you speak English." And he looked like he could sit quietly in a spaceship without breaking anything. Which really wasn't much to ask for, in her opinion.

"I can speak Japanese as well," said Ryu.

"That's great," said Samus, not really listening. "Listen, Ryu, I don't really know you, but you seem like you know how to fight, and –"

"Know how to fight?" Ryu repeated, his eyes shining. "All answers lie in the heart of battle. The only way a true fighter can suffer is by not fighting."

"Okay," said Samus, which seemed the only appropriate response to this. "Then, maybe you want to team up with me against the interlopers. I know I don't look like much, but I have a Power Suit that can sh –"

"It is no matter," said Ryu, shaking his head wisely. "True strength comes from within."

"Great," said Samus. "Is that a yes?"

Ryu smiled at her again. "Yes."

"Samus," said Master Hand from behind her, but she ignored him.

"Thanks," she said sincerely. "I have a spaceship that we can use, and if I get some coordinates, we'll be ready to go – it's quite small, but – are you claustrophobic?"

He looked perplexedly at her.

"It doesn't matter, there'll be plenty of room for just the two of us," said Samus, and tried to make a list in her mind of things they would need. "It's equipped with firepower just in case we're accosted during flight, but if we're lucky, we won't have to use it. It's pretty simple to use, just aim and pull the trigger, but the plasma beam cannon is slightly more complicated…"

"Spaceship?" said Ryu blankly.

"Yes," she said. "It's got a cloaking device, so it can't be tracked…you don't get motion sick, do you?"

Master Hand took hold of her arm and forcibly steered her away, Ryu staring at her as she went.

"Okay, great, I'll see you later then," Samus called over her shoulder. She wrenched her arm out of Master Hand's grip as soon as they were back at the door and hissed, "What was that for?"

"You're already assigned to a group," said Master Hand. "And you don't get your spaceship, either."

She gave him a burning look. "Why not?"

"Because your search will be carried out on a planet called Earth."

"I see," she said, disappointed. She knew all about Earth – at least, her world's version of it. Knowing all this transdimensional nonsense, it was probably different from the planet she was used to.

"Your groups were chosen carefully," said Master Hand, looking out at the odd mixture of creatures. "It's all about balance. There was a lot of thought put into it. We tried to pick people we thought would complement each other. And get along."

"So who's in my group?"

"Three humanoids," said Master Hand, watching her cautiously for her reaction. "Their names are Pit, Link, and Marth. All male, and all swordsmen."

"All swordsmen," she said skeptically. "I thought you said it would be balanced."

"It is," he said. "Pit is a good mark – he shoots arrows and he can fly, sort of. Link has a wide array of equipment and excellent intuition, and he's very brave. Marth is strong, quick, and good at negotiation. You –" Here he paused. "Well, you're smart, good with tracking and you're aggressive. We need someone who's aggressive."

Samus frowned at him. "Where are they?"

"Your group? I don't know." He gestured helplessly at the throng. "Somewhere in there."

She looked at the bobbing heads and then back at Master Hand. "And I'll get along with them?"

He smiled at her, eyes crinkling. "If you're as charming as you are with me, then yes. You will."

Samus was unsure how to respond to this kindness. She settled on scuffing the ground with her feet and giving him a small half-smile. Master Hand was aggravating and could probably be arrested on kidnapping charges, but he wasn't so bad. Certainly not the worst kidnapper she could end up with.

"I suppose it's time for us to part ways," said Master Hand finally. "It's temporary, so don't get too excited."

"I don't even know what my group members look like."

"One of them has wings. And one has blue hair. And the last one has pointed ears. I'm sure you'll find them."

"Wings, hair, ears. Got it."

"Will you be alright here?" said Master Hand, stalling.

"I'm fine," said Samus, and it was true. Once the initial shock was over, she found that she had regained composure. "Are you this motherly with everyone?"

"Just my favorite," said Master Hand. He seemed to be forgetting that she'd threatened to pummel him. Or maybe that added to her charm. "Goodbye, Samus."

She nodded once at him, and with one last wistful look, Master Hand turned and left. The door swung shut with a melodramatic bang, and, seconds later, the comparatively tiny click of a lock. Just to be certain, she tried the door knob. It wouldn't budge.

"Goodbye," she said under her breath, and turned to face her new comrades, warily as a predator in foreign territory. And really, she thought as she watched a winged boy snarl at a man with a sword, that's exactly what they were. A bunch of scared, brooding predators, locked in a cage that was far too small to fit them.

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 **Sorry that this chapter was a bit slow, but it's going to pick up soon! Please review, if you can :) I'm so thankful for your viewership!**


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